Benched: you don’t have to go very far along North End from Marks and Spencer to find a bench where the public can perfectly reasonably take a seat – despite Mayor Perry’s efforts to rip out pieces of harmless public amenity
CROYDON IN CRISIS: Mayor’s ‘reign of error’ now includes removing benches from the high street in attempt to solve anti-social behaviour. Except that it hasn’t… KEN LEE reports
Jason Perry, Croydon’s piss-poor Mayor, has spent much of the past week rubbing shoulders with property developers and attending a “real estate forum” while banging on about “growth”, part of his desperate efforts to cling on to Town Hall power, and his £84,000 salary.
Now you see it…: how the council used public resources to boast about the removal of a couple of public benches, rather than actually deal with the issue
Yet meanwhile, Perry has demonstrated, yet again, that all he delivers are cuts and the removal of services. Or benches.
He even had the council’s propaganda department issue a press release to boast about it. “Croydon businesses have welcomed the removal of benches in Croydon’s North End shopping area to deter antisocial behaviour,” they crowed.
In fact, all that has been removed appears to be just two pairs of metal benches, right outside Marks and Sparks (perhaps where Mrs Perry does much of her shopping?).
It’s all a bit of a distraction trick, the kind that not-very-good end-of-the-pier magicians resort to when pretending that they have made something vanish.
Other benches along North End remain firmly in place, a useful convenience for shoppers to take a break as they hunt for any retail outlets that remain in business under Perry’s “reign of error”.
“Croydon’s Town Centre Taskforce listened to concerns from local businesses about the ongoing antisocial behaviour from some people gathering in large groups at benches in the area,” the council claims. “This was also preventing shoppers and those walking nearby from using them.”
Which seems at variance from reality, given the continued presence of other benches all the way along North End.
Once again, this is an example of Croydon’s Mayor acting at the behest of Croydon BID, the business improvement district for the town centre. Jason Perry, Croydon’s part-time Mayor, is a director of Croydon BID.
In November 2022, Perry introduced a PSPO – a Public Spaces Protection Order – in the town centre, giving the police and council-approved agencies additional powers in respect of street drinking and other anti-social behaviour. Croydon Council is refusing to answer questions about how effective that PSPO has been.
In 2023, around the time he was hiking residents’ Council Tax by an initial 15%, the Tory Mayor decided to axe the jobs of 22 respected and well-regarded safer neighbourhood officers, with entirely predictable results.
Yet when the council secured a £165,000 grant through the government’s Safer Streets Fund, to tackle crime in the town centre, Mayor Perry didn’t allow the council or the Metropolitan Police to use that money. Instead, he handed the cash over to Croydon BID mainly to fund a small team of high street “bounty hunters”, staff hired by a private security firm to issue on-the-spot fines for littering and street drinking.
The removal of the benches in North End demonstrates that the Mayor’s PSPO and use of public money to fund the private security firm has been a failure. Another one.
The bench removal has the full endorsement of the unelected and unaccountable (to the public) Croydon BID.
Closing down sale: while Perry and his mates at Croydon BID remove public seating, business on North End continues to die on its arse
“The decision to remove sections of the seating has made a real difference,” according to Shaun Webster, the BID’s “director of operations”.
“The area now feels noticeably calmer and more welcoming – a much better environment for staff, customers and trade.”
Hmmm. Is Croydon BID’s Webster inhabiting a parallel universe?
A routine visit along the length of the town centre’s run-down shopping street this week observed two rough sleepers (one who had set up camp alongside the artwashing murals outside Allders, where the long-promised new kiosks have still yet to make an appearance), a couple of people begging, and street drinkers harmlessly occupying some of the remaining benches.
Is this what Mayor Perry and Croydon BID mean by “noticeably calmer and more welcoming – a much better environment”? Or are they just deluding themselves?
They claim that their “Town Centre Taskforce” is “a key partnership” which somehow works “with residents and businesses to swiftly tackle antisocial behaviour”. Ignoring the ugly split infinitive, has anyone who does not have a vested interest in Croydon BID or Perry’s re-election campaign actually confirmed that this is the case?
The council has blocked off pedestrian underpasses, at East Croydon and on Wellesley Road, making it more dangerous to cross the busy town centre roads and cutting off Whitgift Centre businesses from potential customers, mostly just because it cannot be bothered to do its job and house the homeless who took refuge in the underpasses, nor to wash and sweep the places on a regular basis.
He was right once: what Perry was saying in 2022
The council claims that this makes “streets and public areas safer and preventing [sic] hazards”.
For his part, in the council-funded propaganda, Perry said, “It is a shame that a few people were consistently being antisocial, which was affecting our businesses and those walking past these groups. The areas where the seating has been removed is [sic] now a lot more pleasant.”
Which is disingenuous to the point of being another Perry porkie pie.
PAID ADS: To advertise your services or products to our 10,000 weekday visitors to the site, as featured on Google News Showcase, email us inside.croydon@btinternet.com for our unbeatable ad rates
- If you have a news story about life in or around Croydon, or want to publicise your residents’ association or business, or if you have a local event to promote, please email us with full details at inside.croydon@btinternet.com
As featured on Google News Showcase
- Our comments section on every report provides all readers with an immediate “right of reply” on all our content. Our comments policy can be read by clicking here
Inside Croydon is a member of the Independent Community News Network
So you can’t perch on a bench for a rest while shopping. Sounds unacceptably unfair to the elderly and infirm. If I had parked in the Whitgift Centre car park and searched for new clothes in M&S, I’d need five minutes sitting down before exploring North End’s shops. Without benches, I can’t leave M&S and will be obliged to take a break in their restaurant. I am being penalised by Croydon and feel most unwelcome!
So potentially another reason for not shopping in Croydon. Another own goal by our spectacularly stupid Mayor.
Although I would not despair too much, Di. As we have found, most of the benches along North End do remain in place. So you ought to find somewhere to rest your weary limbs.
Well, Stratford Westfield will argue to differ. They took some certain seating away after a certain incident for the right reasons!
Walking past Marks and Spencer this morning, I noticed that while some of the benches had disappeared, the people who used to sit on them were still in the immediate vicinity. They were sitting on the pavement, or to be precise, lying down.
Our short-sleeved shirking nightMayor has made another blunder at our expense
I’m tired of your biased leftist blog. Goodbye.
Cheery oh, and don’t let the door catch your gammon arse on the way out.
Bit harsh to use a racist term for the poor bloke. I love IC despite its vaguely Corbynist leanings – readers just need to calm down and appreciate its intelligent and unrivalled content
Gammon is not a racist term, you right-wing snowflake.
David, there’s nothing “leftist” or “biased” about the truth, not unless you’re a right-wing extremist who can’t tolerate legitimate criticism of a failing politician. Your devotion to your neighbour Jason is touching, but don’t expect us to share your delusions, nor respect your hissy fit
In his greasy papered finish propaganda rag Mayor Perry has been claiming great triumphs in seeing off the homeless from around East Croydon station and the removal of the tents in the vicinity as the great victory of his reign. His Tory Crony Councillor in Park Hill has also been trumpeting this as some great triumph without noticing that many homeless people are now being forced to use the plentiful amenity greens in his own Ward as the overspill externality of this glorious battle against the homeless and destitute.
These characters have now deemed sitting down as an anti-social act, but with regard to our magical Mayor if sitting on your posterior is illegal behaviour shouldn’t old Part Time been moved on long ago from his seat?
“The Town Centre PSPO enforcement data from April 2023 to August 2024 reveals … a total of 161 separate incidents … during this period.
*27.3% of all incidents (44 cases) involved individuals who reported being of no fixed abode, highlighting the intersection between homelessness and public space management issues.*
*That’s why the benches have gone, and why I expect the others will follow – to drive the NFAs into the shadows, rather than help them in a meaningful way.*
Street drinking is recorded as the most prolific breach of the PSPO constituting 85% of the incidents.”
[That’ll be 137 of them then, with the 24 other incidents not specified.]
(Violence Reduction Network Strategic Assessment 2024).
No doubt there was no recording of incidents prior to the establishment of the PSPO, and hence it impossible to make any useful comparision.
Let’s get real , all the drug dealers have spread to East croydon and church street. London Square’s Garden around the Corner is being more and more used for antisocial activities too. This Mayor is useless
When I first saw the two photos next to each other I thought that they had been accidentally positioned the wrong way round. The left hand photo looks quite inviting. The first thing I noticed in the right hand “after” photo was the stack of garbage bags. That’s Croydon for you.